However, the titles are often thought of as a commercial failure at the time because they did not last that long (of the three titles that made up the Fourth World line of comics, Mister Miracle lasted the longest at “just” 18 issues).

Here’s the thing, though, the titles were originally INTENDED to be finite!

You see, Kirby believed that comics should try a different approach from just the concept of a monthly periodical. Kirby thought that a better idea would be to do FINITE stories that could then be collected into collections that would be sold in different markets than newsstands. He felt that comic books could be accepted into book stores as complete comic book novels.

As you might have noticed, Kirby’s theories have proven to be correct, as that is what a large chunk of the current comic book marketplace is about – collecting stories into collections that can be sold at book stores.

At the time, though, these ideas were still very daring and DC was not inclined to go along with them. Instead, they specifically told Kirby NOT to make his stories finite. They were paying him X amount of dollars for Y amount of work, so they wanted him to do as many ongoing comics as he could.

Mark Evanier explained the situation back in a 1983 Comic Interview interview with David Anthony Kraft:

Folks forget but the New Gods saga was intended to be a limited series … There was no intention that these characters would go on forever. However, after Jack’s books started getting good sales figures, DC demanded that we keep them going and use guest stars like Deadman, which we were very much against doing. So Kirby had this novel he was forever stuck in the middle of – he could never get to the last chapter. … You can spot the issues where Jack kind of gave up trying to advance the story of Darkseid and Orion and was marking time. If those books had been intended from the start to run indefinitely, they would have been done very differently.

Here’s the Deadman appearance in Forever People…

Of course, the irony of the situation was that then the sales went down and DC canceled the whole line, but by this point, Kirby had already moved away from his finite plans and instead had to quickly wrap up all of his plots and was clearly not able to do so.

Thankfully, DC at least gave Kirby the chance to give his story an ending later in the 1980s…

(Of course, the story behind THAT comic is a legend in and of itself. Another time!)

Thanks so much to Mark Evanier and David Anthony Kraft for the information!
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39 Comments

fraser

Will your legend deal with whether Hunger Dogs was Kirby’s original ending or close to it? The idea of Orion finding love, telling Daddy “Forget the final battle crap” and leaving Darkseid alone on Apokalips is rather startlingly at odds with the old series, though in a good way (i.e., I like it). If anyone else had done it I suspect we’d have screams about how the author clearly didn’t get Kirby.
“He Cheats Death! He Defies Man! No Trap Can Hold Him!”—I love that line.

fraser

As much as I’d love that Kirby had finished The Fourth World the way he originally intended, I really enjoyed Hunger Dogs. The change in tone and intention from the original series show a lot about how Jack’s mindset had evolved over the 15-year period it took to conclude the story. The lack of catharsis via the final confrontation between Orion and Darkseid, The kind of disjointed narrative, the out-of-left-field twist regarding the identity of the scientist behind the “micro-mark”, on top of the pessimistic view on technological advancement make for an uncharacteristically unsettling Kirby tale, which I think is fascinating!

JosephW

Okay. The most interesting thing about that Bizarro story that I *NEED* an answer for: Why do the Bizarros celebrate Halloween on May 24? (Okay–it’s “Maye 24″–according to the calendar in the picture, but still….)

A secondary matter: It’s amazing that the masks are SO horrifying to the rest of the Bizarros that the ones at the center of this story (and it’s rather interesting that there are *four*–three males and one female; could this be a bit of a jab at the FF?) can go around with just the masks and no other costuming and no one can tell who it really is. I mean, one of them actually has a sign reading “Bizarro No 1″ on him. What makes this curious to me about the sheer terror and panic these “ugly Earth people” create is that the regular Bizarros, as far as I can recall, don’t usually react with such terror or panic when they’d meet the real Superman and Supergirl (whose faces would presumably be just as terrifying and horrific as the JFK and Marilyn Monroe masks apparently are).

T.

During the 1950s, while not working at DC Comics (his DC Editorial position was a three days a week gig), he worked at the gossip magazine Inside Story, repackaging gossip stories from other magazine

Wow. So fitting that a guy who’s main contribution to comics was recycling (creating Aquaman, a recycled Namor, Green Arrow, a recycled Batman, and recycling concepts within Superman (Supergirl, Superpets, etc) was also recycling in his career outside of comics as well.

Dan Ahn

There’s a LOT of evidence that JFK and Marilyn had an affair. Everything from her diaries to the non-redacted portions of released CIA documents. It’s all out there, save for an actual sex tape, if that’s what it’d take to prove it to you.

Mark Evanier is one of the luckiest guys in comics. He worked closely with two genius artists Sergio Aragonés and Jack Kirby. Both of these artists could draw entire layouts free form from their imaginations without any sketches.

Jeff Nettleton

The Fourth World Omnibus also includes the story, “Even Gods Must Die,” from the New Gods Baxter reprint series, issue #6. The story links the original Fourth World stories to Hunger Dogs, and (SPOILERS) also revives Desaad and Kalibak, who were destroyed at the end of New Gods #11, the last issue of Kirby’s series. You also get a glimpse of Orion’s mother, Tigra, whom he has come to rescue from Darkseid’s prison. If you want to read Kirby’s Fourth World work, the Omnibus editions are the way to go.

Leocomix

Brian Cronin

Whatever Kirby intended to do, he’d have to follow Infantino’s directions. I find the finite series idea improbable.

Infantino let him take over Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen. I don’t believe Infantino particularly cared WHAT Kirby did, provided it sold well. I think Kirby pitched him on the finite series and it was approved but then when the initial sales were good, Infantino was like, “Are you kidding? We can’t stop this now!”

Anthony

The mentioning of Kirby and toy advertisements got me thinking of a legend I never bothered questioning until now. Kenner’s Super Powers toyline featured several New Gods characters whose toys looked nothing like their comic book appearances. I’d always read that Kirby was asked to redesign his own characters. And that he earned more for doing so than for what he had for creating comics at the time.

Robertmm

When did “iconic” replace “memorable” or “well known” when discussing subjects? It’s gotten to the point that EVERY comics article or description of artwork HAS to be described as “iconic.” I almost feel like playing a drinking game and take a shot of tequila every time I read the word in a comics article. I’m just afraid that I will suffer alcohol poisoning before I finish the article.

P. Boz

Cass

The last legend strikes me as a bit misleading, so if it’s okay, I thought I’d throw in some more quotes from Evanier on the same subject for context. Here’s what Evanier has to say about the conception of Fourth World in the afterword of the first omnibus:

“The story, which he saw as finite at least in its initial arc, would be the war against the intergalactic villain he named Darkseid. The battle might encompass a few thousand pages before it ended, but it would end and it would end with a spectacular finale.”

Then a few sentences later:

“He initially intended to do only the first few issues, and then, as he had with many successful books of his past, hand off to others. Steve Ditko was mentioned to draw Mister Miracle, Wally Wood for Orion, John Romita or Don Heck for The Forever People. For the writing, he intended to work with new talent and to that end he had taken on two youthful assistants, myself and Steve Sherman. Jack would have supervised while (he hoped) moving on to projects in the upscale formats he was proposing. Instead, DC asked that he stick with the three titles until they’d established themselves.”

Reading these all together, it seems to me that the only indicator of finiteness in Kirby’s intent is that he had ending in mind. It’s a bit ridiculous to say “Ok, we’re going to do a limited series. It will be hundreds of issues long and I’ll give the writing and art chores over to other people after the first year.” That’s called an ongoing series in my book.

Brian Cronin

I don’t think that detracts from the legend, Cass. The key point to me was that Kirby had an end goal in mind with the plot of the series that he stopped trying to achieve because they told him that the series wasn’t going to be finite. He obviously had a big plot in mind (and yes, as you note, he initially wanted other creators to finish his plot while he did other books) and that plot was discarded when DC let him know that they weren’t going to let him end the series on his own terms.

And then, of course, they canceled the books before he had a chance to get back to the original plot he had in mind.

Alabaster Alligator

KAM, the last point in your list is a dubious one. “Lost and hidden underwater cities” did not become a common plot element in Aquaman stories until the 1960s–a full twenty years after his debut. Until then he was basically just a policeman of the seas.

Omar Karindu

Also, as originally created, Aquaman wasn’t from Atlantis; he was a human being who’d been physically conditioned by his scientist father so that he could live underwater. In that respect, he’s perhaps a bit like Doc Savage.

the out-of-left-field twist regarding the identity of the scientist behind the “micro-mark”

This was actually part of his plan in the 1970s; “Cancelled Comics Cavalcade” included a never-published New Gods story that uses the same twist.

I did rather like the idea from the Baxter reprint “bridge” story that Darkseid’s resurrection power, like his machines, cannot bring back some ineffable part of the dead, and that Darkseid’s lust for power ends up making him obsolete, paranoid, and incapable of ever really believing that he’s won.

fraser

Joseph, there’s a story where Bizarro terrifies his kids with a Superman puppet. Another where he creates a monster for a horror film and it’s a stunningly handsome blond man who provokes raw terror in everyone who sees him. I admit the stories weren’t consistent (but hey, Bizarro) but the idea they find Earth people horrifying does crop up repeatedly.
While Mort Weisinger may not have created great super-heroes, his record working on Superman encompasses more than just recycling ideas.

Paul

Captain Haddock

Can anyone clarify for me why KIrby was working on the Jimmy Olsen book instead of the main Superman book? Or was that the main book at the time? I would have thought getting Kirby DC would push him to the forefront. Did he have more freedom on Jimmy Olsen?

Brian Cronin

Can anyone clarify for me why KIrby was working on the Jimmy Olsen book instead of the main Superman book? Or was that the main book at the time? I would have thought getting Kirby DC would push him to the forefront. Did he have more freedom on Jimmy Olsen?

Yeah, Kirby asked for a book without a creative team currently on it. At the same time, yes, I think the freedom was an attraction, as well. Plus, to be honest, DC Comics did not seem willing to let him draw their iconic characters in his own style, so that was likely part of his reasoning as well.

Armitage

I don’t remember the comic, but I think it was before the X-Men issue.
I have a recollection of a scene in which Wolverine was climbing a cliff, and he mentally compared it to a name that I don’t remember, which a friend who was a WWII history buff identified as a major operation involving Canadian commandos during the war.
La Difensa, maybe. That involved the joint US/Canadian Devil’s Brigade climbing a sheer cliff to assault a German base in Italy.

darklighter

Yep looks like he was onto the whole Kennedy/Monroe affair and was bragging without bragging. Not to mention finally outing the big Mickey Mantle/Jerry Lewis gay fling way before anyone knew that either.

Jeff Nettleton

Kirby on Jimmy Olsen produced some pretty wild stories, which took years for people to get a handle on. Really, if you look at the Fourth World stories, Jimmy Olsen has got some of the more outré ideas, but also some of the more interesting concepts. It provided a goldmine of material which was revisited in the 90s, to great effect. Then there was Goody Rickles…. I have to say that Mister Miracle is my favorite overall (though I first encountered the character in the Steve Englehart/Marshall Rogers revived series, in the later 70s); but, Jimmy Olsen is a very close second. Forever People has always felt the weakest, to me.

fraser

I’d rate Jimmy Olsen below Forever People, but yeah, of the main Fourth world books, Forever People was definitely the feeblest. However Glorious Godfrey and the Justifiers remain a very creepy depiction of blindly authoritarian fanatics (though it seems pretty obvious Kirby intended them as Nazi allegory). I hate that post Crisis Godfrey became some kind of super-hypnotist–Kirby’s idea that he’s just plain manipulative and his followers choose to give up their free will is creepier.

M-Wolverine

Anyone know the story reasoning for having the Black Widow in that story too, completely altering her character? Having Wolverine meet Cap makes sense as as story concept…saying the Black Widow is really old and has super powers seems like a weird throw in, that was never followed up on in X-Men and only left for people writing that character to “clear up” later.

The whole Stern-Byrne-Zeck-all the way to 300 era of Cap was a great run of contributors and stories, though. Sorry they didn’t get to do the Wolverine story first.